The Long Dark

[Multi-headed Cow]

Hello,

We're happy to share the 35th update to The Long Dark's Sandbox, bringing the game version to v.212. Changelist below.

*** We have confirmed that save games from the previous version should work fine with this update.

CHANGELIST FOR THE LONG DARK SANDBOX UPDATE #35 to v.212

MAJOR IMPROVEMENTS

* Expanded "transition zones" between Mystery Lake and Coastal Highway, and Coastal Highway and Pleasant Valley.
* Updated Wolf stalking behaviours, animation, and vocalizations to improve player's ability to gauge intentions and specific location. This should make Wolves easier to avoid.
* Modified audible "cone" to help highlight wildlife vocalizations and increase the player's ability to extract usable gameplay information from the audio environment.
* (VOYAGEUR ONLY) Hostile Wildlife now only spawns between 18-36 hours after game start.
* Expanded Cave and Radio Tower Hut interiors.
* Added 9 new Achievements.
* Updated Crafting, Firestarting, Feed Fire, Foraging, and Container UIs to match the revised style and improved functionality.
* General content optimizations in Pleasant Valley to improve performance.
* (EXPERIMENTAL) Removed precise clock; all game times now expressed in terms of hours of daylight or remaining night.
* Modified wildlife spawn times. It is now possible to temporarily depopulate an area of wildlife if they are hunted/harvested too aggressively. This also applies to Wolves.


MINOR IMPROVEMENTS

* Added short progress bar to plant Harvesting.
* Rebalanced Food Poisoning to re-introduce it as a credible risk.
* Rebalanced fire heat radius and fuel type efficiency to make outdoor fires more useful.
* Rebalanced Cooked Fish to retain more of Raw Fish's Caloric value.
* Improved performance of Save system.
* Feeding wildlife will no longer attack non-aggressive targets.
* Updated sound effects for various inventory items.
* New ambient music for Pleasant Valley.
* Added new Bear "smelling" and "standing" animations.
* Improved Wolf "turning" animations, to remove sidestepping.
* Wildlife will only attack you when sleeping if wildlife is spawned and in the area.
* Properly simulate corpse decimation due to feeding when in unloaded scene.
* Rabbit Pelt is now used to repair Rabbitskin Mitts (instead of Leather).
* Wolfskin Pelt is now used to repair the Wolfskin Coat (instead of Leather).
* Wolves and Bears will stop attacking when the player falls through the ice.
* Added Truck and Tractor assets.
* Resized several items that were too large relative to game camera.


BUGS FIXED

* Fixed wildlife respawning issues that could cause permanent depopulation in an area.
* Fixed issues with corpses disappearing on steep slopes after loading a save game.
* Fixed issues with corpses sometimes standing or floating.
* Fixed issue with player health being reset to 100% if loading a save after a Bear attack.
* Fixed exploit of getting full fatigue benefit from a partial cup of coffee.
* Fixed bug that caused the rifle to sometimes unequip after loading a game.
* Fixed issue with Wolves investigating the location of dropped food after the player picked it back up.
* Fixed UI getting cut off at low aspect ratios.
* Fixed collision issue on bridge in Pleasant Valley that could cause fatal falls.
* Fixed issue where mouse cursor would centre itself after using food/drink/first aid from Inventory.
* Fixed buried stove near Trailers in Mystery Lake.
* Fixed some localization/text errors.

### END OF CHANGELIST ###

 

[cvv]

Updated Wolf...

...stalking behaviours, animation, and vocalizations to improve player's ability to gauge intentions and specific location.

Wake me when there's some real change to the wolves.

 

[Burning Bridges]

You should begin a new game, a lot has changed. I did not see even 1 wolf during the first 24 hours. The patch notes say they do no longer spawn at the beginning of the game and will slowly enter the scene as difficulty rises. Also a lot of people (mostly who have hardly played or not played at all) seem to be fixated by the idea that wolves inevitably ruin the game (which they do at times but that's a huge difference), and will not shut up unless wolves were completely removed from the game. As long as I consider the game unbalanced and you can die from stupid causes, there is a simple solution which is to backup the savegame from time to time.

 

[cvv]

No, wolves should stay and they should be deadly but evidently there's something wrong with the devs' original vision since vast majority of gamers do complain. Idk what should change, I'm not paid to, what i do know is wolves shouldn't ruin the joy of exploration. I'm glad they eased up on the number of wolves, that was a big problem and I'll definitely try the game soon.

 

[Burning Bridges]

I can see their problem. At one point they had wolves aggressiveness so low that the game became simply too easy. I spent 100 days in the game most of them just counting bullets and meat rations. Then they swung round to zombie wolves (much too aggressive and intent on killing you) and back several times.

At the same time, people new to the game (most of all those goddamn, dense youtubers) generally exaggerate the "brutal" difficulty. Like omg I died four times in a row, this game is just totally Brütal! I would like to see one of those people dock to a coriolis station in the original Elite. I guess his brain would just explode when he dies for the 150th time.

In fact, it is not a difficult game at all if they would just act rationally. It is just too difficult to some people in that it requires you to be rational. I see lots of people do everything wrong, and in a survival situation they'd have less chance to survive than a headless chicken. Of course they stuff EVERYTHING in their pocket. I have yet to see the first youtuber who is not always encumbered, all of the time. They make constanly unnecessary decisions on the fly like, oh I could repair my jeans and then harvest wood for 2h at 12 midday, and while I am at that frozen corpse of course I also forage his guts and leather.

In fact practically all you need to do on a regular basis in the game is eat, drink and rest and know whats in your inventory, everything else should be planned in the long term.

The wolves are imo, annoying, a deus ax machina that from time to time damages my (otherwise excellent) health and forces me to break routine, but otherwise the game is pretty easy. Up to now wolves are a failed attempt to add some challenge. But I already read between the lines of Raphaels comments that they can only work as intended once they have more of the game in place, like NPCs and other stuff. I think they will work in the future, just right now wolves are responsible to prevent the game from becoming uninteresting. So once you get into this game you should be prepared that your sovereignty of the maps will have to be fought against wolves.

It can not be said often enough that the game is not complete but has a lot content already. So it makes sense to wait until the game is complety but not trying the alpha "because of Wooolves" is pretty stupid imo. Just dont be a pussy.

 

[cvv]

It's clear wolves are supposed to be just a part of more complex system. I hope they'll pull it off. As you said, there should be more hazards - threats that you can die from if not careful. Wolves should not be the only thing that prevents the game from being routine or easy.

One example - the best survival game in that regard - that I've played at least - is Don't Starve. You can die very quickly but it's usually because you're too reckless or haven't learned the survival rules properly. You have to watch your food, sanity, temperature, day/night cycle, wildlife and special events. All of that is beautifully woven into a balanced threat system. If Long Dark ends up in a similar state I'll be a happy camper.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Have you tried Stranded Deep by the way? It looks like it has a lot in common.

As to what would make it better, imo that would be large random maps that actually feel like continents. It would be a whole new experience to stumble through a blizzard with 2 remaining cartridges, some morsels of food, and no definite information as to where you will rest the next time. Right now it feels strange that I am supposed to feel lost when I know every square inch of the map, and there is shelter every couple of hundred meters. It would also add to the game if you primarily die from bad weather, not wolf combat. But hey, they put a lot of sweat into those maps and they are not able to work on random stuff for a long time to come, I am just speculating what should work in the long term.

Still I have nothing but respect for those guys. My personal game of the year 2014 without doubt, and a hopeful new genre. It's a pity we dont already have 10 more games like it, though Stranded Deep, Firewatch and some others look promising.

Looks interesting. It'd be nice if hte wolves were an optional setting.

They should make it moddable so the vanilla game can be easy to play and to make. Single player game without moddability gets watered down or loses funding almost everytime, carrying with it a bad reptutation even if it succeeds.

Sorry a little clarification is due. They are already optional. If you choose Pilgrim difficulty, wildlife will not be hostile to the player. And, as you will also find, no one wants to play Pilgrim

 

[cvv]

Have you tried Stranded Deep by the way? It looks like it has a lot in common.

I haven't yet though it's on my radar. It's been released for EA just recently so I suppose it's gonna be still very rough. From reading the comments it's shaping up to be quite good but I'm gonna wait.

Only thing that bugs me is the price. A complex survival game in a modern 3D engine for 15 euro seems a bit suspicious to be honest. Same problem for The Forest and Rust, but I haven't tried any of those yet either.

 

[Starwars]

I have not tried this latest update but for me, my complaints about the wolves were not really that they made things more difficult (though it was frustrating at times). It's more that they... I dunno. They broke the "feels" of the game in my opinion. It's definitely a hard thing to balance because the game *should* be hard. But The Long Dark relies so much on its atmosphere and ambience to be succesful in my opinion, it tries for a certain realism. And most of the the time, in the previous builds I tried, I ran into the wolves it was like I was instantly pulled out from that world and thrown into "vidya game" territory with monsters at each turn carefully placed at certain chokepoints and so forth. I *want* the gameplay of being careful around wolves, I *want* the game to be hard, but I *don't* want the game to be "avoid wildlife simulator". How? Fuck if I know.

The latest patch sound interesting though. I was extremely impressed with how solid the game felt when I played it and I'm really interested in seeing what they will be doing with the story mode, other survivors etc.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Correct, absolutely correct the wolves seem to be in the way of enjoying the game and they piss off almost everyone of us. But it's an Alpha, and they apparently dont want this to be just a demo where you walk through Canada, collect food tins and then eat them by a fire. That might be interesting for the unique athmosphere for a short time, but once it gets old, it gets really old. What we need are more varied threats like avalanches, accidental fires and a lot more, diseases, and more persistent weather, persistent food crises and then hostile NPCs and finally, it all needs to be balanced.

Same problem for The Forest and Rust, but I haven't tried any of those yet either.

I think Forest and Rust are different, more of the Zombie fare.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Btw I havent played Stranded Deep either, just watched a lot of videos and I like what I see. It's certainly no sin to wait for another half year until they've ironed out their alpha. I'd also like bigger islands with less stuff and especially less shipwrecks.

Oh Man someone should make a game that begins like l'ile mysterieuse by Jule Verne, or like Robinson Crusoe, or Earth Abides, omg omg I would play this for the rest of my life. Recently I realized that I was playing Morrowind just for that reason, that it had some of that gameplay and I completely ignored all the other stuff.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Put some hours into the new version and the wolves seem very different. First off they were non existant on the first two days, probably they dont spawn. Then one attacked me right away when I left the Camp Office, I shot him. Since then I have only seen two wolves from far away, there seem to be less of them, at least for the moment. I also killed Fluffy in the dam which was quite an epic fight because it appears much darker inside. I had put my lantern on the floor and then ran after him which was a mistake. The ravine has become a real map now which was a really nice surprise, I hope they will put more such transition maps in between the regular ones. Crafting seems more logical and has additional options. All in all the game feels better balanced to me.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Another thing I had to learn is to make up my mind faster. The wolves react quicker than in previous versions. That means if you can shoot a wolf better not wait too long. I had several situations turn around and escalate in mere seconds because I wanted to place a perfect shot.

 

[Burning Bridges]

A small update. Wolves are really less of a distraction, simply because there are now much less of them. In medium difficulty I still get attacked once every few days, and they still have zombie wolf AI. Depopulation means that every wolf that you shoot dissapears for ca 2 days. It's therefore recommended that you get a rfile soon and clear up the surroundings before they can surprise you.

The not so good news, this version has stability problem. Someone half heartedly admitted that they had to make quick and dirty fixes because Unity cannot handle the larger scenes anymore. Allegedly this is all to go away when they move to Unity 5 and with multi core support the game will run at ca 60 million fps. Well, we'll see. In any event I wanted to warn anyone that version .218 is by far the worst in terms of stability I have seen yet (previous versions where excellent though). Also a lot more small bugs like getting stuck is now really a possibility. But as I said, the game was once almost bug free, so in perspective it's still entirely play- and enjoyable.

 

[Burning Bridges]

As of today Unity 5 version is available as beta. http://www.hinterlandforums.com/viewtopic.php?f=55&t=4917
Performance claims (60 fps all the way) have obviously reduced to 20%, some people report worse performance than with Unity 4. LOL
But better than nothing. Hopefully they can continue to concentrate on content and not on their crappy tool.

 

[cvv]

Looking forward to that Wasteland 2 GOTY then.

 

[Burning Bridges]

People are reporting a noticeable improvement. fps never were an issue to me though, I like how the game looks on Low.
I rather hope they can produce more, and larger maps. I already know almost everything and once you know the borders there isn't that much to explore. 19km^2 in Pleasant Valley sound a lot but are just a little over 4km*4km.
I also hope they do something about the transition times when leaving buildings, that has compounded pretty badly, compared to the blazing fast times in earlier versions.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Gameplay wise, there is a lot of ammunition on the maps, 20-40 rounds per map. I got used to shooting wolves whenever they come to close.
When you kill one, sometimes two wolves you get 2 days of respite in that area. It's better to do it when you have the chance, once they charge you they become hard to hit so make sure you place one, lethal shot in the head.
It's important to hit them. They often survive the first shot but with 20% and less hitpoints you can kill them off in close combat with two powerful strikes.
Also keep your rifle in good condition it has an influence on damage.

 

[A horse of course]

Is this game still in early access?

 

[sigma1932]

I have yet to see the first youtuber who is not always encumbered, all of the time. They make constanly unnecessary decisions...

Paul Soares Jr.'s lets play is decent in these regards. It took him a bit to catch on to some of the not-so-obvious mechanics (such as, IIRC, running instead of walking making you fatigued quicker, and fatigue level affecting your max carry-weight, etc.) but he's generally pretty good at making sensible decisions concerning inventory and time-management (the latter being extremely important in this game since it doesn't let you multi-task), and his video series in general are reasonably entertaining in a LARPy sort of way.

 

[Disgruntled]

How are the npcs coming along?

 

[Burning Bridges]

Nothing new. The latest patch brought bows and some stuff. I would expect that npc are heavily worked on right now, that's why updates have become rarer.

 

[someone else]

Fun with bows and doggies!

 

[sser]

This game worth $10 or is it pretty far off from being finished?

 

[Starwars]

I'm not sure how "complete" it is regarding to features that will be included. But it's missing the entire "campaign" part as of now, only having the sandbox (basically see how long you can survive) portion up for now. But yeah, it's hard to say how much progress they've made in actually getting the game *done*.

For 10 bucks, I'd certainly feel it was worth it, especially if you're into survival games. I've had some good fun in the sandbox mode. It's pretty polished for early access.